Is Islam a religion of love and peace?

Maremia, this is a very old thread.
Greatnan died some years ago. She was a well respected and liked poster

All the major religions of the world teach a moral and ethical code and teach that believers should love not only their immediate family but all people.

Unfortunately, humans make mistakes. Both the ordinary believers and the clerics who are preaching or teaching the message.

If every man and woman in the world who said they were either a Christian, Jew, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, or Socialist for that matter really tried to love both the people they know and those they don't, to share goods and food with those in need, and to work for peace, rather than profit, then indeed we might be able to call all and any religion a religion of peace and love.

I am old enough to remember both Arafat and Ian Paisley inciting to violence whilst loudly proclaiming their alligeince to Islam in the one case and Christianity in another, and frankly there was nought to choose been those two.

AuntieE Sadly, this is not the case. There is a great difference between the teachings of Christianity and the teachings of Islam (the only religions I know much about). If you have a look at my post on this thread posted on 28 Jan 26 at 14:55 (page 3 for me), you will see what I mean.

People can look online for themselves to see if the quotations in that post are misrepresentations. (They aren’t.)

Not all religions teach that believers should love all people. Here’s another quotation from the Qur’an, Sura 48.29.

//Muḥammad is the Messenger of Allāh; and those with him are forceful against the disbelievers [non-Muslims], merciful among themselves.//

Sura 98.6 says that those who disbelieve [Islam] among the people of the Book [Jews and Christians] are ‘the worst of creatures’.

WW, mark 2 In that most “Christian of countries across the Atlantic there are states where child marriage is legal with the consent of parents ,amd the recent rulings on women’s rights will take them back to the middle of the last century .
Yet it seems,s the Trump followers done see any of it as a problem…is that a lack of education?Or is it their evangelical approach to their god?
Whatever it is I don’t see the same traits in my Muslim friends who came here and live very western lives .work hard ,long hours support their kids in getting well educated and contribute both their taxes and their time in the community
SAdly the media and the likes of Farage have been hell bent on causing division and it seems to be working…would that be a lack of education ?Or can it be firmly laid at the doors of a biased media?

The UK has a different culture to the USA. Our colonial past means strong links between say Pakistan and India where the majority of my non white neighbours are from. Immigrants usually work hard, they come here for a better life, for good education which they value.

Reform is extremely active in the less deprived areas, like mine. Our black and Asian neighbours tend to be teachers, doctors, pharmacists. There’s a big council estate on the edge of our village. It’s got a growing population of African refugees with settled status. The children mix happily in local schools.

I agree, some elements of news media and some politicians seek to divide and stir what must be called as it is, racism.

The education thing is valuable to "always been here" Brits too, as there didn't seem a long gap between education for all (leaving age 14 in 1918) and the privilege of education being taken for granted & not exploited to the full in our state system.( I certainly felt this in the 60's & 70s).

Having a decent proportion of pupils whose family really appreciate & push the value of education, can only be to the benefit of everyone in that class.

Maybe I could have explained more clearly (at 15:15 on 06 April 26, page 8).

Unlike in Christianity, in Islam salvation depends on someone’s good deeds outweighing their bad deeds, and even then it’s not certain.

In Christianity your good deeds don’t have to outweigh your bad deeds. If you trust and follow Jesus, all the bad things you have done are forgiven at once. Then you obey him as well as you can, not to gain salvation, but out of love and gratitude. You will still sin, but you confess and are forgiven as you go along.

//For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith– and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God– not by works [what you do], so that no one can boast.//
- Ephesians 2.8-9

In Christianity salvation is guaranteed:

//And this is the testimony: God has given us [Christians] eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.//
‭‭ - 1 John‬ ‭5‬.11‬-‭12‬ ‭

A young Muslim who has led a particularly bad life can never be confident of salvation, even if he lived perfectly from then on. His only guaranteed path to salvation is dying in the cause of Allah (in jihad).